I've never seen a local pizza place give pizza away. I really cant remember if I've seen a chain give away pizza if it wasnt sponsored by someone else.
I think you a bit of a kook...go try the pizza and get back to us.
New Pizza place in Ames
- Thread starter bmuff
- Start date
I've never seen a local pizza place give pizza away. I really cant remember if I've seen a chain give away pizza if it wasnt sponsored by someone else.
I think you a bit of a kook...go try the pizza and get back to us.
I've seen chains give away pizzas or least sell them at heavily discounted prices. Going away from pizzas, places like Chipotles give away food as part of their grand openings. I know they are a heavy funded chain as they are owned by McDonalds but still.
Even if it did require a sponsor, I think that the place could've done a much better job marketing to the community. Building a sponsorship with another establishment/business in town would go a long way in doing good business.
If I honestly hadn't heard about it here, I wouldn't have known about it at all, and I am an Ames resident (non student) that eats out (or used to eat out) more often than the typical family of 4, which is who they are apparently trying to target.
If they could've sponsored partially an ISU event, or did some commercial on the radio, it would go a long way. Take Happy Joe's for example. I hadn't ate there until I lived in Ames for a few years, yet I see their ads and sponsorships everywhere. I decided to try them once I got a coupon since I knew about them. I also drove past it often and decided "lets give this a try".
With Black Market, they aren't doing that at all.
We have Old Chicago, Pizza Ranch, Pizza Hut, a couple of Papa Johns, Gumbis, Jeffs, Dominos, Great Plains, Godfathers Express (in a gas station), Happy Joe's, George's, Casey's, Papa Murphys, Pizza Pit, GeAngelo's, HyVee also makes some very good pizzas on the spot with some really good deals occassionaly, Valentinos, and now we're adding Black Market.
That's 19 pizza options for a town of 50,000 (more like 25,000 over the breaks).
Then you factor in that Black Market is behind on marketing, deals, brand loyalty, and in a less visible location from those places combined with being funded questionably, how can you not figure it won't last?
Don't forget that since this is a college town, we also have frozen pizzas in grocery stores that range from ($1.25 to $7 each, with some very good ones usually in the $2-$3 range).
I've seen good restaurants in this town go out of business because of all factors NOT related to the menu. It takes a sound business plan to keep your doors open and all I am saying is that they don't have one.
I plan on trying it this weekend, but no matter how good it is, the prices alone would probably result in this being an "every once in a while" kind of place...
One more thing about the giveaways. A LOT of places in Chicago, and on the East Coast will give away free new menu items with the purchase of a normal one. It doesn't have to be a 100% giveaway, but a BOGO or something like that...
This isn't Chicago or the east coast which are both completed saturated with all types of eateries trying to distinguish themselves. This is Ames, Iowa. A new place comes along ever two years. I'm going to try it for several reasons. First: It's new! Second: It's different! Third: It's actually opening in an area close to my house which is severly lacking in dining establishments. If you find the price to be too high for you in your current situation, don't go. I know tons of people that live in Ames who don't care about a few dollars more for a premium product. Free food and discounts don't work on me when it comes to trying new things. I'll try something new because it's new.
I agree people will try something because it's new, but it doesn't mean they will come back. A pizza place has to have a fairly large number of regulars to do well.
Also, 50,000 people is a small town to me. To have 19+ pizza options in such a small town is rather silly in my opinion. I would say that the pizza market in Ames is pretty saturated as well.
It also looks like Iowa is 3rd in pizza places per capita, further supporting my claim that there are a lot of pizza options for the size:
http://www.pmq.com/mag/2001summer/capita2.gif
http://www.pmq.com/mag/2001summer/capita2.gif
I would say that their location insulates them a little from the cycles. Those would hurt more in campustown. There are a LOT of people living on the north end of town with not very many food options close. This could give them more regulars due to having a more captive customer base. I do agree that their prices lend to it being an "every once in awhile" purchase though.
Of course it doesn't mean I'll come back unless I enjoy the experience. There may be 20 pizza places in Ames but at least half of them I don't like because I don't enjoy their pizza. The others will depend upon what I feel like having. If one is giving away discounts and the other isn't, it doesn't matter to me. I'm going to choose the establishment that will cure my craving.
This is how you know ISU athletics is doing poorly. People are arguing over pizza. Not transfers, wins/losses, rumors, etc. Pizza of all things.
- Mar 27, 2006
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Ok, I like a good debate. If you go to Yellowpages.com and look up Pizza restaurants in Des Moines Iowa, you will find that there are 83 different pizza places. (Not including the metro) Census data estimates the population of Des Moines to be right around 200,000. That comes out to 1 pizza place for approximately every 2400 people.
Using the same search criteria, Ames shows 20 pizza places, backing up your claim of 19. If Ames has 50,000 residents, that comes to about 1 pizza place for every 2500 people.
Seems like a pretty similar ratio to me.
Haha, just out of protest, I'm not going to eat pizza until ISU wins something that matters. I won't even microwave a Totino's either.
I agree that would be a similar ratio, but Iowa has a lot of pizza places per capita.
Many on here were saying Chicago has a saturated pizza market. Using Yellowpages.com there are 857 pizza places (not counting the metro area). Chicago has a population of 2.8 million people, which equates to 1 for every 3,200 people or so.
People were also saying the same for New York. There are 1248 pizza places and 8.2 million people which equates to 1 for every 6570 people.
So if Chicago and NY are saturated, I would say Ames and Des Moines are already over-saturated!
?????
Looks like numbers work better for you if you don't include parts.
I'm going to count Ames pizza joints, but I'm not going to count Campustown or Downtown. Sound good?
I would agree places are over-saturated with crap. Give me a pizza that actually tastes good and that I crave to eat again. Unfortunately, only about 25% of the pizza places I have pizza from meet this criteria. You can say a place is over-saturated if the pizza places are directly competing with each other. Dominoes and Black Market aren't direct competitors because they provide different services. The same can be said for a lot of the other pizza places in Ames from my point of view. The only real direct competitors with Black Market that I can see are Great Plains, Valentinos, and Old Chicago. 4 establishments for 25,000 people is terrible. I want more.
These numbers surprise me, I would have thought it would be a much smaller 1 to _____ ratio. I figured it out for my home town and it was 1 to 1634.4 people based on current pizza places and the 2000 census. Guess Iowan's like pizza.
I probably shouldn't have included Valentinos in this because it is more inline with Happy Joes. It's really just GP, OC, and BM.
